Feminist News

Mary Thom, Former Ms. Magazine Executive Editor, Dies at 68

Mary Thom, one of the longest serving editors of Ms. Magazine, died in a motorcycle crash over the weekend. Thom was the Editor in Chief of the Women's Media Center.

Thom joinedMs. Magazine in 1972 as a researcher and stayed with the magazine for twenty years as executive editor. In 1992, Thom wrote Inside Ms.: 25 Years of the Magazine and the Feminist Movement, a history of the magazine. She also edited a compilation of letters sent to Ms. from 1972 to 1987.

The co-founders of the Women's Media Center, Jane Fonda, Gloria Steinem, and Robin Morgan, said in a statement "Ms. Magazine, the Women's Media Center, the women's movement and American journalism have suffered an enormous blow. Mary was and will always be our moral compass and steady heart."

"She was always there," said Eleanor Smeal, president of Feminist Majority Foundation and publisher of Ms. Magazine. "She was always there as a guiding hand to make sure that the spirit of feminism came through in everything in the writing at Ms. Magazine and later at Women's Media Center. She strengthened the writing of two generations of feminists. She will truly be missed."